It’s official. After months of waiting, free transfers in less than 10 seconds are finally available to all EU residents, regardless of their bank. Since March 13, the European Council and Parliament have required banks to offer free instant transfers. More concretely, they had to be able to receive them from January 8, 2025, and must be able to issue them by October 8, 2025. An obligation that changes everything: until now, French banks could invoice fees for instant transfers, which varied from bank to bank, generally around €1.
What is an instant transfer?
This is a bank transfer that is executed in less than 30 seconds, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, unlike traditional transfers which can take several business days. This type of transfer is particularly useful for urgent payments or for sending money to relatives or service providers located in the euro zone.
So far, only 25 banks out of 128 in France offer instant transfers free of charge. A figure which contributed to the very relative popularity of the system, which represented only 6.4% of transfers made in France in 2023, reports a study by the Banque de France observatory. The objective of this new deployment is to “make instant transfer the payment channel of the future at European level. First, because it makes it possible to reduce the proportion of payment methods that are not secure enough, such as checks. And, above all, it is a tool of sovereignty for the European Union in the field of transactions“, explains Maxime Chipoy, president of MoneyVox to our colleagues at Parisian.
Beware of fraud
The generalization of instant transfers is good news for consumers, but it is also accompanied by higher risk of fraud and error. As part of a contactless transfer, the payment is irrevocable, so there can be no recall of funds in the event of a recipient error. Care must therefore be taken to pay attention to possible careless errors, even if payment service providers are now required to offer free of charge a system for confirming the consistency between the name of the beneficiary and the IBAN entered. Enough to continue the efforts of the Banque de France, which reports a clear reduction in the fraud rate via this systematic recourse.
-In general, the platform Signal-Scams recommends to reserve instant transfers for your loved onesor to people you trust. In the event of a recipient error or a comma to your disadvantage, your bank will not be required to reimburse you. As a reminder, instant transfers can be executed up to €100,000.
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